Morning journal and courier., 1887-07-29
The Late Conjurer, Hermann.


 He seemed to defy the impossible. I re- member once on Change in Buenos Ayres (where, by the way, he was an extensive and most unlucky operator), at an hour when the building was crowded with nfen, after 8 short delay, on being challenged to exhibit some tour de force, he lifted his hat and dis played his own boot on his head-this, be it observed, without going near table or, as far as anyone had noticed, seeking any con- cealment for his bare foot or opportunity to remove his hat. For special occasions he spared no time, trouble or expense before hand that some feat might wear the appear ance of complete spontaneity. Mention has already been made in some of the newspa- pers of his casting the Sultan's watch into the Bosphorus. That did not witness, but l was in Constantinople when he dined with the British minister and a number of other gentlemen. In the course of his meal he raised his glass, which had just been filled with champagne, above his head, and, at tracing the attention of all present by cry ing, "Oh, what beautiful wine" caused the champagne to sink in the glass and vanish. On being replenished the same thing oc- eurred the third time the glass disappeared also. Now the glamor of this seemed purely incidental to the situation, but I happened to know the forethought and energy which had been expended over it, especially in con- nection with the difficulties of ascertaining the precise pattern Of the champagne glasses likely to be used and of matching them. Specialties like this were planned for execu- tion at all the courts where his skill was manifested, and there is no doubt that his personal influence, his adroitness and his ex- traordinary familiarity with all tongues and patois were invoked more than once by those in authority for other ends.
 He would never suffer himself to be out done by any other necromancer; hence his possession of apparatus which he despised. His goldfish bowls were larger than those of other prestidigitateurs Gone, before me as write, now serves as sufficiently capacious bath for a family of thirty little Japanese snakes); where they worked with pigeons he used fowls and geese; and from the hat he would produce not merely tin goblets, card board boxes and compressible balls, but metal tea-kettles and lighted lamps. His singularly long, spare body, admitted of his dress coat containing two tiers of s'loading pockets" and afforded great facilities for concealment. When at Cairo he was ri vailed by troupe of Arab snake-charmers, and in spite of his detestation of serpents, he forced himself to initiate their maneu- vres with two cobras from which the fangs had been taken. Such was his horror of these reptiles, however, that more than once he was impelled to rush from the stage and tear off his coat, where they were lying snugly slowed away in the profondes. He designed an ingenious wand for transforma- tion into living snake. This was hollow tube painted black to resemble his usual magic wand. A snake of suitable length was caused to enter this, and metal cap was screwed firmly on as soon as it's tail was in. The head would now project about an inch at the other end, over which a rather loosely fitting cap was placed, the whole then look ing exactly like an ordinary ebony baton. To the screwed end fine silk cord was at tached, passing up the sleeve, across the chest beneath the shirt front, and down the other arm, where it was tied around the wrist, the length being so adapted that it admitted of the wand being held with both hands when the arms were bent, but effected it's rapid withdrawal up the sleeve when the opposite arm was extended. (One of the vanishing bird-cages is managed on a sim liar principle.) The loose cap was to be removed and palmed with (say) the left hand, the snakes head exposed, grasped and drawn forward, the action of extension causing the wand to disappear. The effect was marvellous, but he never used it in public, nor would he avail himself of the services of 8 couple of young boa constric- tors which I tanned for him at his own re- quest. In South America, however. he sometimes turned cage full of brilliant plunged tanagers into bloated swamp toads, though he didn't like them either.